Templates, Preferences, Availability and Breaks all share the underlying concept of Recurring Schedules.
In this document we will use 'Roster' to refer equally to Templates, Preferences, Availability and Breaks.
A Recurring Schedule describes an activity that occurs on a regular basis. For example John has a shift every Monday.
Recurring schedules are designed to make it less tedious to setup Rosters. Instead of defining a shift for every Monday of the year, you just set up a single schedule.
In some cases you may need to add multiple Schedules to fully describe an Agent's roster.
So lets look at the elements of a schedule.
Period
The Period of a schedule describes the interval over which the schedule recurs. The following Periods are available:
- Weekly - the staff has the same roster (preference or availability) each week.
- Odd Weeks -the staff member has the same roster on odd weeks.
- Even Weeks - the staff member has the same roster every even week
- Single Day - the staff member has the same roster every day (this isn't used very often).
Odd and Even weeks can be used when you have two staff members that work alternating weeks. Set on to Odd Weeks and the other to Even Weeks.
Start Date
The first date from which the roster should start.
End Date
The last date (inclusive) which the roster should be active.
Type
- On Call - used for staff that are on call. Normal breaks and maximum shift periods don't apply.
- Roster - a normal Roster.
Time Period
The Time Period allows you to set one or more Time Periods within the above 'Period' that the Agents is to be rostered.
You MUST have at least one Time Period set for each Template, Preference etc.
To add a Time Period, click the '+' button.
You may need to add several Time Periods to fully describe the Agents recurring schedule.
A Time period is composed of:
- Enabled - a convenient way of disabling a Time Period
- Day - describes what days the Time Period applies to.
- 24 Hours - if ticked then this roster covers a 24 hour period - normally only used with On Call staff.
- Start Time - the start time each 'Day' that the roster starts.
- End Time - the end time each 'Day' the roster ends.
The Days field perhaps needs a little more explanation.
The Days field describes on which day the Start Time and End to apply. For example if you selected 'Week days' then this implies that the Agent should be Rostered each day of the working week (Monday - Friday) on the given times.
The Days fields options are:
- Monday - Sunday
- Any day - every day of the week.
- Week days - Monday through Friday
- Week end - Saturday and Sunday
Combining Time Periods
Sometimes a single Time Period may not be sufficient to describe the Agent's roster.
For example they might work 9-5 on Mondays and Wednesdays and 10 - 4 on Weekends. This will require three Time Periods as below: